SOS Review: Tenchi Muyo! Ryo Ohki (OVA) Episode 2- "Here Comes Ayeka" (Or Is It Spelled Aeka?)

*By Tenchi Muyo! Ryo Ohki, I mean all three OVA series.

Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki Episode 2
Aeka ga Deta! 

阿重霞が出た
Here Comes Ayeka

Contains Spoilers

Synopsis: The episode begins with some space tree receiving the rainbow lasers from last episode. This awakens a couple of talking logs who then release a young woman from stasis. The woman asks what planet they arrived to. She is told the planet is called "Colonized Planet 0315", aka Earth. She then figures that this is where her brother, Yosho, is. The logs tell her that only Ryoko was detected, but logically speaking, Yosho would have followed her. The lady expresses disdain for Ryoko and someone or something called Ryo-Ohki while watching on screen Ryoko's statute of limitations run out, and is not happy about it, wondering why she isn't wanted forever. One of the logs refers to a decision made by the Supreme Council of Jurai. She doesn't care, and then she decides to descend toward Ryoko's location and capture her.

Meanwhile, Tenchi is gawking at Ryoko, who is still on his bed. She then asks for his balls. Tenchi declines, thinking she's talking about his junk. She's actually referring to the gems in his sword, and proceeds to wrestle Tenchi for the sword. Ryoko grabs it, but the sword shocks her instead. While this is going on, Tenchi's father hears the noise and wonders what's up. He peeks into Tenchi's room and is surprised to see a young lady in there with him. Meanwhile, Ryoko pleads with Tenchi to give her back her gems, telling him about a devil lady. That "devil lady" Ryoko refers to is the woman inside the ship, who is going to begin capture protocol, also ordering the ship to refrain from firing. Tenchi wants to know if a peaceful arrangement is possible, but Ryoko tells him otherwise. Meanwhile, Tenchi's father is videotaping his son with Ryoko and the tree-ship appears, scaring the hell out of him. The lady orders Ryoko to show herself, who doesn't, and then orders a shot to fired nearby. This is enough to convince Tenchi to give her back her gems, or rather, one of them. This allows Ryoko (unhappy that she only got one gem back, but gets over it) to summon her ship, Ryo-Ohki, who rises out of a lake with a "meow", then arrives to Ryoko's location, who then shrinks Tenchi's house and father and brings them on board. They try to get away, but are eventually captured by the unnamed young lady.

Some time later, the young lady interrogates Ryoko about the sword that Tenchi was carrying, and then about her (half-)brother, Yosho. Ryoko doesn't answer the question, and proceeds to receive electroshock therapy, which she seems to enjoy. The lady, referred to as a princess of Jurai by Ryoko, wonders if she is a masochist; but Ryoko answers that she is a sadist. The princess accuses Ryoko of being responsible for Yosho's disappearance, then shocks her with the sword. Ryoko then mentions that Tenchi would know more about Yosho; the princess assumes that Ryoko is referring to the sword, which has the same name as the boy. The princess is advised by flying, talking gems that it is her bedtime, so she retires for the night.


Meanwhile, Tenchi is stuck in some kind of tree cell. He attempts to move the branches to escape, but fails, then he grabs a knife and tries to cut the branches, but is interrupted by a young girl. She introduces herself as Sasami, tells Tenchi about the ship, then frees him with an object similar to his sword, which he no longer has. So, Tenchi asks Sasami to return him home; but, she'll only do so if he does something for her.

We cut away to the princess. She is getting ready for bed and while doing so listens to a recording from Yosho. His message is that he is off to fight a criminal and that he will return. She finishes the message by stating that when he returns, she, who now has a name, Aeka (or Ayeka, I'll explain later), is to become his bride (...). Right after she turns out the lights, Tenchi and Sasami arrive. Their plan is to have Tenchi go and steal Aeka's head ornament. He seems reluctant, but complies with Sasami, nonetheless. So, he sneaks in, sees the head ornament...on Aeka's head, and wonders how he'll remove it without waking her. He then notices the sword...that she's clutching, so he decides to retrieve it first. He is unsuccessful as he wakes her up. From her perspective, he looks like he's doing something...else. Anyway, she screams, Tenchi tries to keep her quiet, is unsuccessful, he gets kicked but manages to get the sword, and then he hightails it out of there. The two logs, Azaka and Kamidake, give chase, in order to put Tenchi to death per Aeka's command. He picks up Sasami, and asks if she can do anything to stop the logs, but she can't as they belong to her sister. They continue running until they run into a tree portal.

The portal brings them to where Ryoko is being held. Tenchi frees her, albeit accidentally through the sword. Sasami asks who the old lady is, and Ryoko is not happy about being called an old lady (oba-chan). She is happy, though, that Tenchi retrieved the sword; she then proceeds to retrieve the other two gems still embedded in the sword. But, they are interrupted by Aeka, who notices that it was Sasami who released Tenchi. She then asks him about the owner of the sword. He tells her that the owner passed away a long time ago, but Aeka doesn't believe him. Tenchi tells her that's how it's told in the legend. She asks for that person's name, and he tells her his name was Yosho. Aeka is in disbelief and orders the logs to charge at them. Ryoko holds an energy sword to Sasami, but she is then captured by vines. The logs then go after Tenchi, Sasami begs them to stop, as does Tenchi. The logs are stopped, but only because of the sword; Aeka notices this, and can't believe that Yosho is dead. Ryoko, now freed, calls Ryo-Ohki up. The ship stabs a hole in Aeka's ship and Tenchi and Ryoko escape. Ryoko decides to have Aeka brought down to Earth so that she no longer causes any trouble. Tenchi pleads with Ryoko not to do this, but she doesn't care. Ultimately they all crash, destroying a bridge in the process. 

The next morning, the incident about the Great Seto Bridge's destruction by what is described as a meteor is on the news. We then see that Tenchi's house and father, who is taking all of this very well, have been restored and are now by Tenchi's grandfather's shrine. Ryoko comments that Tenchi doesn't have a scratch and Sasami mentions that their (Aeka's) ship took most of the damage. Tenchi's dad asks where the other one (Aeka) went. It turns out that she is trying to resurrect her ship, but no avail as it sinks deeper into the lake.

Review/Analysis: I really got to find a way to shorten these summaries. It doesn't help that I watch the episode and write the synopsis up at the same time, but, oh well. Anyway, I liked this episode for the most part, but I have a few questions. However, we'll get to those later.

First off, the episode continued from the last one very well. We see those rainbow lasers that were

sent off last episode received by Aeka's ship, and we see the continuation with Ryoko in Tenchi's room. Every scene from there seems to move smoothly into the next, the pacing is consistent, and we learned a bit more about our characters.

From what I've seen in these first two episodes is that each event almost, if not, directly leads into the next. The progression is logical, even in this episode alone. After Aeka wakes up, she wants to find Yosho, her brother, but instead finds out that Ryoko is there instead. Aeka attacks, Ryoko calls Ryo-Ohki and runs away with Tenchi and are then captured. Every event makes logical sense. If there were any surprises in this episode, it would be Sasami's introduction. She does not appear until we see Tenchi being held captive. That's not to say that she doesn't make sense to the story; she frees Tenchi, agrees to help him if he retrieves Aeka's head ornament, which ultimately leads to Ryoko's freedom, her escape with Tenchi in Ryo-Ohki, which leads to their return to earth. So, everything that happens has some sort of reason behind it. 
 
The only possible exception to all the logic here is that they land at the lake by Tenchi's grandfather's shrine even though they clearly crashed into a bridge and the next thing we see occurs the next morning at Tenchi's house, restored, which is now located at the lake. There isn't any real explanation for it here, so it does raise some questions here, but I'll try to speculate anyway. My best guess is that the ships did not stop moving after the crash into the Seto Bridge and eventually made their way to the lake by the shrine. Other than this, I don't see questionable logic in this episode at all.

Another oddity that I did notice is that Tenchi's house and his father we're both shrunken down in order to fit on Ryo-Ohki. I didn't understand how this makes sense, and it probably doesn't; but it's Ryoko, she can do whatever she wants, I guess. This at least leadsto the plot point of all of them living near the shrine, so I guess I'll have to accept it; this better help the plot pretty damn well, and from what I've seen so far, I'd venture that as highly likely.

There are a couple other things that did intrigue me, though. The first being that Aeka is betrothed to her brother Yosho. Yeah, read that again. Brother and sister, or rather half siblings, are engaged to be married. I'm not one to care for incest, to put it lightly. In real world terms, it's just plain wrong! Be that as it may, though, I'll try to explain the reasoning for this as well. It has more to do with how royal families conduct themselves; they want to keep that royal blood "pure" and they want to keep themselves in power, so they married into other royal families in order to make political alliances, this kept up until the point that all those royal families were related due to a shrinkage in the gene pool; this was very common in European royalty. The most famous of these is the Hapsburg family of Europe, which is also where the condition of mandibular prognathism, or Hapsburg Jaw, was a family trait, which highlights a genetic risk to inbreeding. As said, though, royal inbreeding was due more to political motivation than anything, so let's leave it at that. I won't say anything more on this subject  unless it is warranted.

The other thing that intrigued me was Aeka's shock and disbelief at the revelation that her brother, Yosho, is dead. Even after she discovered that her brother's sword, the one Tenchi has, is in sync with Tenchi. This may be simple denial and that realization will eventually occur, or there may be something more to this story; but that's what the next episode is for. If the going logic follows, it would make sense to explore Aeka's background a bit along with Yosho's. Again, we'll find out soon.

One last thing, I have seen Aeka's name spelled Ayeka. I'm guessing it's spelled that way in order to provide emphasis and proper pronunciation on the "ae" syllable/character/sound as there is no "ye" syllable/character/sound in Japanese. Since I like to be as authentic as possible, I'll go with the original romanization of the name. That's just me, either way is correct, though.

Overall, this was a very good episode. I look forward to what happens next!

As always, feel free to express your thoughts on the this review an other things that I have written about here. Dialogue is always appreciated.

Until next time, God Bless!